Category: Advising

As those of you have followed my blog are aware, I am the faculty mentor to the McDaniel College Green Terror football team (a NCAA Division 3 team). I started this role in October of 2016, so I have had just over a year of learning about this culture and my place in it. And I am still learning. In particular, there is a lot I have to understand about how to connect with young men of this age group.

I am now turning to my between-semester projects, and one of them is to begin to determine what it is like to be a young man in today's college environment, when you are also a member of a football team. From what I can tell, it's a lot to navigate. While there is no way I can personally relate to this, I am a scholar. And scholars research. We seek out information. Thus, today, in my first free moments after grades were submitted yesterday (!), I am already back at it, researching. And this is what I have found so far:

I will be reading The Trouble with Boys by Peg Tyre. It was recommended to me by a colleague to help me understand the developmental pathways that got boys to where they are as college men, as well as to help understand why we see them failing in some of their courses. I'm eager to get started on this work.

In addition, I spent some time surfing the web, and found Keith Edwards, a sociologist and professor at Stony Brook University, who has been researching men and masculinity and has been a consultant for the past fifteen years. His website includes a brief video, which is a Ted-style talk about the issue that you can see here. One of the things he said that really spoke to me was this:

"What we need to do is give them permission to stop being the men they think they have to be and permission to start being who they really are, their authentic selves." (emphasis mine)

I really want to help them do this. I am so impressed with many of the young men I have met and worked with thus far in my role as mentor to the team.

But there is also a lot of personal struggle, hurt, and difficulties that they face. And it is hard for them to show, share, and/or discuss their emotions. But they have them. And honestly? Right now I do not feel very well-equipped to really know what to say or what to do.

But I again remind myself that have been there before. I have started from near zero before, and then learned. I know that I can begin to understand these issues if I employ the same tenacity I used to become an expert in art history, teaching online, and using active learning techniques.

Do you have any sources or suggestions of what I could read to help understand and support young men in their college lives? Please leave a comment below!

As I look over this past year, I have had a full-on education as the faculty mentor of the McDaniel College football team. I now have seen first-hand a full year of the playing of the season, the recruiting of the team, and summer camp. I have met some of the new recruits, and have gotten to know some of the coaches a bit better. It's been a long process, but one that has been very interesting. And because I am curious and love learning new things, it's been very exciting.

And while there is always more to learn, I have learned a lot. Here is a list of some of those things:

These students move around constantly at practice. Sitting still in a 90-minute lecture must be brutal. Enter active learning, for at least part of every one of my classes.

Higher ed systems are sometimes murky and unclear to students. Many students on the team are first-generation, a trend that will only continue. They are not sure what questions to ask, let alone who to ask. Sometimes our offices can act, perhaps unintentionally, that if students have to ask, maybe they should not be here.

Money can be a real issue and they are not thinking long-term of how the degree will help them after college. Goal-setting and motivation for post-college plans are really important.

Mentoring is not advising. I can help students navigate their course requirements as an advisor, but mentoring requires a different tack. To mentor a student is to see the whole student. I see them as football players as well as academic students. They share with me their struggles in their lives and their goals and dreams. Faculty need to know that there is a difference between these two roles, and both are very important to student success.

What I have witnessed makes me more committed than ever to supporting the student athletes in my classes. I will get the chance with twenty (count 'em up, I did!) players in my Art of the Medieval World class coming this spring. I will need to be on my game for them, and those of you who read this blog regularly know that I will be. It will be a challenge, but I am determined to meet it!

I hope to be sharing some of the techniques for supporting student athletes as a consultant in the coming months. I am going to be doing further study about what these players need in their lives as students to be successful on the field, in the classroom, and in life. I want to be as much of a part of that success as possible, and I want our institution to support them in as many ways as possible.

If you are student athlete, what additional help would you like to see from your institution?

I get how expensive college is. I wince when we list the tuition and room and board at the private, liberal arts college where I teach. I wonder how anyone can pay it (and I know we discount, and I know there are scholarships; I still wince). So, I totally understand how parents must be stressed to the hilt about paying for this very important investment in their son or daughter’s future. And I know they want it to “pay off” in the form of a job after graduation. I get that.

But what I don’t get is that parents don’t want their child to major in anything that is not “practical.”

I received what I consider a heart-breaking query from an incoming student to McDaniel asking me what art class she could take because she “loves art” and can’t imagine her life without it, but her parents would never let her major in it.

It’s her life. And yet the parents will not let her choose her major.

That makes me so sad. It also makes me feel that much more gratitude (even though I already feel grateful) towards my parents for putting none of that pressure on me. My father always said I needed to follow my passion/love. Furthermore, he always encouraged me saying that you can always find a way to make a living if you love what you do. I will likely never make a million dollars because I chose to teach and I realize with my full-time, tenured job that I am very lucky and privileged. I love what I do and I found a way. All the way back when I was a first-year student in college and took my first art history course, I just couldn’t imagine my life without it.

But what if I had parents that said I could not major in Art? I would like to think that another path would still have led me to teaching. But what if it didn't?

I haven’t met the student referenced above in person, yet. We have just corresponded by email. But I think of all the studies that show people who major in liberal arts disciplines make more money over time than those who go into more “practical” fields.

I don’t know if that will satisfy her parents. And I don’t know if she can make that argument to them. But her story does make me realize even more the pressure that students are under – from us as faculty, from parents and other family members, from peers. And I wonder if I should be doing something different in my classes.

I heard on a podcast this morning that yes, parents want their children to be safe and secure. And that includes making sure that they can support themselves. But people, these young people are the ones that must live their lives. And they deserve to be happy. And only the individual can decide what will make him or her happy. Parents cannot decide what will bring happiness.

I am wondering if you have encountered such comments from students and how you answer them. And if you are as student reading this, what is your experience like? How do you decide on a major?